What is the difference whether a man is in the penitentiary, or whether he is in the despotism of some European state? "Ah, but," they say, "you let the laborer of Europe come here himself." Yes, and I am in favor of it always. Why? This world belongs to the human race. And when they come here, in a little while they have our wants, and if they do not their children do, and you will find the second generation of Irishmen or Germans or of any other nationality just as patriotic as the tenth generation from the first immigrant. I want them to come. Then they get our habits.

Who wants free trade? Only those who want us for their customers, who would like to sell us everything that we use—England, Germany, all those countries. And why? Because one American will buy more than one thousand, yes, five thousand Asiatics. America consumes more to-day than China and India, more than ten billion would of semi-civilized and barbarous peoples. What do they buy—what does England sell? A little powder, a little whiskey, cheap calico, some blankets—a few things of that kind. What does the American purchase? Everything that civilized man uses or that civilized man can want.

England wants this market. Give her free trade, and she will become the most powerful, the richest nation that ever had her territories marked upon the map of the world. And what do we become? Nobodies. Poor. Invention will be lost, our minds will grow clumsy, the wondrous, deft hand of the mechanic paralyzed—a great raw material producing country—ignorant, poor, barbaric. I want the cotton that is raised in this country to be spun here, to be woven into cloth. I want everything that we use to be made by Americans. We can make the cloth, we can raise the food to feed and to clothe this Nation, and the Nation is now only in its infancy.

Somehow people do not understand this. They really think we are getting filled up. Look at the map of this country. See the valley of the Mississippi. Put your hand on it. Trace the rivers coming from the Rocky Mountains and the Alleghanies, and sweeping down to the Gulf, and know that in the valley of the Mississippi, with its wondrous tributaries, there can live and there can be civilized and educated five hundred millions of human beings.

Let us have some sense. I want to show you how far this goes beyond the intellectual horizon of some people who hold office. For instance: We have a tariff on lead, and by virtue of that tariff on lead nearly every silver mine is worked in this country. Take the tariff from lead and there would remain in the clutch of the rocks, of the quartz misers, for all time, millions and millions of silver; but when that is put with lead, and lead runs with silver, they can make enough on lead and silver to pay for the mining, and the result is that millions and millions are added every year to the wealth of the United States.

Let me tell you another thing: There is not a State in the Union but has something it wants protected. And Louisiana—a Democratic State, and will be just as long as Democrats count the votes—Louisiana has the impudence to talk about free trade and yet it wants its sugar protected. Kentucky says free trade, except hemp; and if anything needs protection it is hemp. Missouri says hemp and lead. Colorado, lead and wool; and so you can make the tour of the States and every one is for free trade with an exception—that exception being to the advantage of that State, and when you put the exceptions together you have protected the industries of all the States.

Now, if the Democratic party is in favor of anything, it is in favor of free trade. If President Clevelands message means anything it means free trade. And why? Because it says to every man that gets protection: If you will look about you, you will find that you pay for something else that is protected more than you receive in benefits for what is protected of yours; consequently the logic of that is free trade. They believe in it I have no doubt. When the whole world is civilized, when men are everywhere free, when they all have something like the same tastes and ambitions, when they love their families and their children, when they want the same kind of food and roofs above them—if that day shall ever come—the world can afford to have its trade free, but do not put the labor of America on a par with the labor of the Old World.

Now, about taxes—internal revenue. That was resorted to in time of war. The Democratic party made it necessary. We had to tax everything to beat back the Democratic hosts, North and South. Now, understand me. I know that thousands and hundreds of thousands of individual Democrats were for this country, and were as pure patriots as ever marched beneath the flag. I know that—hundreds of thousands of them. I am speaking of the party organization that staid at home and passed resolutions that every time the Union forces won a victory the Constitution had been violated. I understand that. Those taxes were put on in time of war, because it was necessary. Direct taxation is always odious. A government dislikes, to be represented among all the people by a tax gatherer, by an official who visits homes carrying consternation and grief wherever he goes. Everybody, from the most ancient times of which I have ever read, until the present moment, dislikes a tax gatherer. I have never yet seen in any cemetery a monument with this inscription: "Sacred to the memory of the man who loved to pay his taxes." It is far better if we can collect the needed revenue of this Government indirectly. But, they say, you must not take the taxes off tobacco; you must not take the taxes off alcohol or spirits or whiskey. Why? Because it is immoral to take off the taxes. Do you believe that there was, on the average, any more drunkenness in this country before the tax was put on than there is now? I do not. I believe there is as much liquor drank to-day, per capita, as there ever was in the United States. I will not blame the Democratic party. I do not care what they drink. What they think is what I have to do with. I will be plain with them, because I know lots of fellows in the Democratic party, and that is the only bad thing about them—splendid fellows. And I know a good many Republicans, and I am willing to take my oath that that is the only good thing about them. So, let us all be fair.

I want the taxes taken from tobacco and whiskey; and why? Because it is a war measure that should not be carried on in peace; and in the second place, I do not want that system inaugurated in this country, unless there is an absolute necessity for it, and the moment the necessity is gone, stop it.

The moral side of this question? Only a couple of years ago, I think it was, the Prohibitionists said that they wanted this tax taken from alcohol. Why? Because as long as the Government licensed, as long as the Government taxed and received sixty millions of dollars in revenue, just so long the Government would make this business respectable, just so long the Government would be in partnership with this liquor crime. That is what they said then. Now we say take the tax off, and they say it is immoral. Now, I have a little philosophy about this. I may be entirely wrong, but I am going to give it to you. You never can make great men and great women, by keeping them out of the way of temptation. You have to educate them to withstand temptation. It is all nonsense to tie a man's hands behind him and then praise him for not picking pockets. I believe that temperance walks hand in hand with liberty. Just as life becomes valuable, people take care of it. Just as life is great, and splendid and noble, as long as the future is a kind of gallery filled with the ideal, just so long will we take care of ourselves and avoid dissipation of every kind. Do you know, I believe, as much as I believe that I am living, that if the Mississippi itself were pure whiskey and its banks loaf sugar, and all the flats covered with mint, and all the bushes grew teaspoons and tumblers, there would not be any more drunkenness than there is now!